Water tanks and preliminary calculations

Discussion in 'Designing, building, making and powering your life' started by waynemus, May 4, 2007.

  1. waynemus

    waynemus Junior Member

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    At the moment I am attempting to do all the calculations in regards to purchase and installation of a Water Tank. I was hoping to get a bit of help, and confirmation with this.

    My father has been closed to the idea of a tank. He sees responsibility for water as being the State Government's, and that the only solution is another dam. Recently after doing the number crunching and talking with him about the issues involved he has become more receptive to the idea. He used to tell me to "Shutup about a bloody tank!". He now at least talks about it. But his latest statement is that "It would cost $3000 for a tank, and I'm not spending that much money on water." Hopefully I can slowly convince him of the benefits. He moved from "We're not getting solar panels" to "We will get them when the new silver cells are available."

    According to my calculations we receive between 190,680 litres and 285,300 litres of rainfall on our roof annually. The Bureau of Meteorology has a map which shows my area of the world receives between 600mm and 900mm of Annual Rainfall. We have two rooftops available for collection of rainfall. These are our garage (total roof area of 132m2), and our house (total roof area of 185m2). I figure the total volume of water on our roof is calculated by Total Roof Area * Rainfall Level = Cubic Volume * 1000 (litres in a cubic metre) = Total Volume. Is this formula the correct one? We won't be able to harness all this rain, but I hope to gather as much as possible.

    The plan is to convice my father to harness as much Self-Sourced Renewable energy before he retires in 4 years. I hope to install rainwater tanks, solar power, and a vegetable garden. The water will hopefully go into the garden.

    Can people please let me know about the expenses involved in purchasing and installing a tank? What features should I look at? What size tank should I look at? What arguments could I use in convincing my father of the value of purchasing a tank (i.e. no water restrictions, more moral approach to water usage, etc)?

    Thanks for the help,

    Wayne
     
  2. kathleenmc

    kathleenmc Junior Member

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    Hi waynemus....

    1 square metre of roof x l ml of rain = 1 ltre of water

    keep it up with Pa....with the idea that all of us will have to start to pay big time for water eventually and the stuff out of the sky is free!

    You would have to calculate how much water is needed for what purposes. But your friendly tank people should have all that info. Lot's of them out there so shop around.

    Cheers Kathleen
     
  3. waynemus

    waynemus Junior Member

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    Thanks Kathleen.

    According to our last water bill we have used an average of 400 litres per day for each of the last 4 quarters. This means that we use about 146,000 litres a year. Not sure what we can replace with rain water. Can you filter water for drinking, cooking, and showering?

    I was reading a book today (Organic Gardener by Monty Don) which said that an average garden looses (per square metre) about 5 litres of water on a sunny day, and 2 litres on a cold day. The book was published for primarily UK readership, so the warmer Australian climate may drain the soil more. Does anyone have similar data for the Melbourne climate? This means for my 45 sqm garden I need to replace between 90 litres, and 225 litres a day. Anyone got any info on water requirements of a vegetable garden?

    Going to keep it up. My mother told me not to push the issue, as hostility may kill any opportunity of getting a tank. My neighbours use tanks, but only a small 800 litre tank.

    I hope to get the vegetable garden going. According to Diggers you need about the same area as I have for a 4 person family. With only 3 people at home now, we have 1 person worth of Vegetables to share around to fellow neighbours in the court.

    Thanks Again,

    Wayne
     
  4. car2522

    car2522 Junior Member

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    Hi Wayne,

    As a person fighting against the Qld state Gov against damming our valley, destroying 1000 families in the dam footprint and 1000's more up and down stream, sending 3 endangered animals to extinction etc etc (I can go on all day). You should remind your dad that dams don't make water and they only store it if it is a good dam. Many dams are bad at storing water and most good sites are already dammed in Aus. The cost/energy used in moving the water around is much higher than producing water using desalination plants for example. There are many better solutions - like as you say tanks. We have enough dams and need more tanks, more recycling, desalination in some places at some times and better use of what we use. Also in terms of veges they will grow much better with tank water, it tasts better, and no-one can tell you how much to use. No Big Brother telling me how long to have showers - my husband does that, but I can tell him to get lost. Good luck Car2522
     
  5. waynemus

    waynemus Junior Member

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    Hey Car2522,

    Interesting point about dams only storing water, not creating it. Obviously anywhere in Melbourne to be damed would be in low rainfall areas. So Tanks in Suburbia is the best way to go. Just got to justify the costs to conservative people like my father.

    You mention that the energy involved with tranportation of water is greater with a dam, than production in a desalination plant. Could you direct me to any documents that will drive home the point? My father holds heresay of his son in low regard. The reason why progress was only made after number crunching, and referencing documents. The solar panel issue progressed after showing my father our local Council's (Knox) report on renewable energy, which spoke about Silver Cells and the pay-back period.

    As far as Tank water tasting better. I read a report this evening : Link here. about the lack of fluride in tank water, and the increased risk to tooth decay. Are there any health effects caused or promoted by Tank Water usage, that should be included in discussion with my father?

    Thanks again,

    Wayne
     
  6. sweetpea

    sweetpea Junior Member

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    waynemus, the sweetest sound at my place is the trickle of water running into a water tank! That means everything is okay, and there is a huge amount of saved water when I need it. It is one of the most crucial parts of my farm, since don't get any rain for 8 months straight.

    Are you only going to use this as water for the garden? Not drinking water? White PVC pipe is the safest, Schedule 40 is thinner and lets in more light, which will create algae inside the white pipe, which isn't good for drinking. Schedule 80 is thicker, and gives more protection against algae. If you are only going to use this water to water the garden, then don't worry about the algea. Plants love it.

    for the roof water, you'll need a filter for the water to run through first, so bits of debris, leaves, twigs from the roof don't get into the tanks and block up small water lines.

    The tanks need to be secured to the ground. You'd think that water in them would do the trick, but if a valve or line breaksand the tank doesn't fill up after yo use it, they are just like big balloons.

    I put window screen over the opening to the tank before the lid goes on because little critters crawl in there, even little frogs, and they shouldn't be in there. If they die, they clog up the water lines. I have water lines open and leak and snails crawl in, I don't see them, I close up the water line and suddenly there's a clog. It takes a while to flush a snail shell out of the line, so always check with a flashlight before you close something up.

    I am on the side of a hill, so I use gravity flow. I have one 2500 gallon tank, and one 1200 gallon tank in two different locations so I can get water everywhere I need to. The 1200 gallon tank overflows and then runs into the 2500 gallon tank because of the height of the tank on the hillside, that's the only way it will work in my situation. The 1200 gallon tank is a backup in case a valve breaks and the other tank empties out. I always pull from the bigger tank. Several small tanks are easier to keep in place than one huge, tall tank. You can also add them as you can afford them this way.

    The tanks are plastic and are made by a tank company, so they say they are safe to put drinking water in. There isn't much I can do, so I overlook the plastic part :). I have an inlet valve at the top, and outlet valve at the bottom, and an overflow line that runs back into the line coming from the bottom outlet valve. Gravity takes the overflow across and down to the bigger tank.

    There are special tank fittings that screw into the hole you cut in the pipe to put the valves on. The tank company should be able to explain all of this. Then I buy big plastic valves in the sprinkler section of the hardware store that screw into the tank fitting, then the line gets attached to the valve.

    I keep my tanks covered with shade cloth because the sun does eventually break the plastic down. I put metal hardware cloth underneath each tank to keep rodents from digging up underneath them and chewing through them.

    I use a drip system on all plants, no sprinklers which require high water pressure and blow water off uselessly into the air. The high pressure from the 2500 gallon tank is enough to run it downhill through drippers. All overflow water from the final tank gets routed back to the highest part of my garden on the hill and goes out through dripper lines that I control so that the water leaches down through the whole growing area.

    These tanks are always a good idea in case of fire, as well.

    I'm sure the tank company will have all the answers about the tanks for you.

    And, of course, mulch, mulch, mulch with leaves and straw to keep that moisture in the ground, and you'll use less water :)

    Here's a good book about the Home Water System:

    https://www.amazon.com/Home-Water-Supply ... 284&sr=1-1

    Here's a interesting book about ferrocement water tanks:

    https://www.amazon.com/Water-Storage-Eme ... 284&sr=1-1

    I don't have experience with those, maybe someone here will. :)

    Dang those big links, sorry.

    If it seems unlikely you'll get a tank, you can always save roof water in garbage cans with lids. I have 8 plastic garbage cans, at 32 gallons each, that's 250 gallons (sorry, I'm not sure about liters) . You could at least show your dad just how effective it is to save water this way for not much money. Keep the lids on them so the mosquitos won't get in there.

    Here's a link for calculations:

    https://www.polyworld.com.au/calculations.htm
     
  7. gardenlen

    gardenlen Group for banned users

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    g'day wayne,

    yes the 1 x 1 x 1 factor is about the easiest and best calculator.

    you can't go by what BOM tell s you you need to work out your needs from actual rainfall, here's an example for sth/east qld last month the average was 3mm we actually got 6mm, so as you add more noughts into that then the more hit and miss their figures can be. so at 400 litres per day that is 12,000 litres per month divide that by roof area, so that is how much rain you need to keep that tank full each month.

    there are dry months of the year to consider so that needs to be considered. for us when we where on rural 2 of us where drought proof on 3 X 25,000 litre tanks in an area that actually delivered 700mm to 1200mm over the 6 years we where there. we would have been even better off with anotehr 2 tanks or even 3 that size. once a tank over fills that is water that can't be recouped.

    now having said all that your 400 litres a day is going to need to be better managed from how i see it, we where using a max av' of 90 litres per day on those 3 tanks, so at this point you are going to need to cut your use roughly in 1/2.

    funny thing hey dams' don't make water, tanks don't either it all needs to fall from the sky. why not drink the tank water? you don't believe all that fear hype floating around do you? we drink ours well in rural you had to or perish, and even now back in the 'burb's we drink ours, it leaves that stuff in the taps for dead, "fluride" who needs it? it isn't a natural thing in natural water, so that factor doesn't factor, the best tooth care brush 'em once a day at least.

    you can put in a flilter to filter the water you wish to drink it will need to be a carbon impreganted filter which if not serviced correctly can contaminate the water that is realy about as good as water can come. just fit your diverters for 1st flush. as for the rest of teh house why would you want to filter for those uses? you hot water system will last longer once it has pure clean water going through it.

    also when you are ready to buy check the rural tank makers up here they are heaps cheaper on supply than the local rip off boys. installation is all diy.

    not sure if it is from your end 'wayne' but there is no word wrap on your post makes it extremely difficult to read.

    len
     
  8. waynemus

    waynemus Junior Member

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    Thanks Sweetpea and GardenLen!

    I'll hopefully do a bit of reading, and some more numbercrunching and get a more definite figure.

    Looking for those books on Libraries Australia (Australia's National Bibliography), I found the books in a Melbourne Library. Guess I'll have to take a trip to a Library and use one of my many Public Library memberships (knew they'd come in useful someday).

    GardenLen do you know how to calculate the rainfall received on a specific property? Do you use some for of meteorological device and do the observations yourself? I was going by the map the BOM have in their Climate Map section. It shows a wider area, and has rather large divisions. We're near the Dandenongs (mountain range) so should receive more rain than say the West Side of Melbourne. However some have said that the rain seems to circulate around our area, leaving us missing out on the bulk of it. Hope to get more definite figures, maybe I can track down a Meteorological Appreciation group, or a retired BOM employee to help.

    I hope to get a full system installed. Hopefully by a qualified plumber. This will include gutter guards, first flow diverters, filters, the tank, etc. Looking into reading up about it all, before talking much more with my father.

    As we have two roofs on the one block I thought it easier to install two tanks. The Garage and House sit at odd angles to another, and very little room to have a joint tank (we have an odd shaped 1/4 acre block). The garage will be used primarily for garden and garage activities. The house tank used mostly for the house.

    As for 400 litres being excessive, I must confess I have a long shower daily, and also put my washing out more regularly than I possibly need to. The shower is because of the frequency of my hair becoming oily. Thought was fixed, but a friend told me the body moderates. Strip it of oil, and it will pump out lots more, leave the oil there, and the body won't pump out so much. When I'm game enough (possibly on the Holidays) I might trial it. As for the clothes washing, my mother rather lovely washes my clothes frequently. Hopefully when I finish working at a Real Estate agent part time, I can get away with longer periods between washes.

    As for checking the 'Rural' versus the 'Local' boys, looking into it already. Made an enquiry with a Plastic Tank manufacturer and installer in Bendigo. Hoping to get some prices later.

    My father keeps hyping on about a 6000 gallon tank is the essential size for a family tank. Is this about right with others? The Victorian Government give $1000.00 rebate for the installation of a tank. Guess the $3000.00 my father quoted just dropped by a third.

    Thanks again,

    Wayne

    P.S. Len what do you mean by WordWrap? As in the post defaults to setting the continuation of a paragraph on the next line? Seems okay from my end. Then again I'm one of those hooligans who has the resolution on the highest setting. That might stuff things up I guess.
     
  9. dgriffith

    dgriffith Junior Member

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    If you're wondering about daily evaporation figures, you can check the BOM -
    On their daily weather observations pages , they state daily evaporation.

    Eg:

    https://www.bom.gov.au/climate/dwo/IDCJD ... test.shtml

    This is either calculated by incident solar energy + ambient temp or directly with a, uh, evaporometer :lol:
     
  10. ho-hum

    ho-hum New Member

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    Wayne,

    I grew up with tank water and we had 6 of us and a shop attached to the house on about 1/3 acre. At a guess we had about 6000 gallons capacity [we also had 2 x 500 gallon rainwater tanks]. So the 6000 gall. thing may have been some sort of 'family standard'.

    We didnt ever run out of water but we did have access to an irrigation pipeline that we could use for between 24 -48 hours about every 6 weeks from september to january to fill our tanks up. That is when, if we had time, all the gardens were soaked. I cant remember us watering the lawns that much though.

    floot
     
  11. waynemus

    waynemus Junior Member

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    Thanks for that dgriffith and floot.

    Interesting that according to BOM Melbourne receives about 25% of rainfall than what is evaporated. Do we gain water other ways thans rain? Wouldn't we be losing 4 times the amount of water than we were gaining? Probably shows I'm a humanities buff, but are there any science buffs out there that can explain the data and process to me?

    Just had an interesting conversation with my father about Renewable and the repay rate. We worked it out that a tank would take 5 years to repay, and Solar about 7-10. I made an interesting point to him that such an estimate is working on fixed costs. And that if prices increase pay back time decreases. So to invest money now, would lead to greater returns in the future. His counter argument was the return of the investment was less than interest returned from Shares etc, so you could put $10,000 in bank and pay for costings. Made some in roads, just got to clench the deal.

    My father said that the installation of a tank would lead to a decrease in water costs, but an increase in electricity consumption/charges. He said that a tank would require the use of a pump, requiring masses of electricity to support it. We both agreed that a tank would only be viable if supported by Renewable Electricity.

    Another win for the Greenie Son was that Renewable could end up profitable for the Conservative Father. My father reckons that of the three people living at home, I'm responsible for 50% of the Elec./Water usage. Meaning if he gets renewable energy, and I leave home in a few years, it will present a positive financial return, as the Electricity company buys the excess power.

    An interesting arrangement I proposed was that when I finish my Diploma and start full time work in a library I could invest in Household Infrastructure, rather than paying board. Not sure how it would work, as a couple of years of now. But I could pay for a tank/solar panel set-up, giving my parents free electricity and water (possibly vegies as well). Have to wait and see what happens with this one.

    Thanks for the support. Will keep you posted. Keep all the arguments and info coming, as its all slowly winning my father over.

    Thanks again,

    Wayne
     
  12. Jim Bob

    Jim Bob Junior Member

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    If you calculate things purely on the basis of money earned vs time and effort invested then we should all be on the dole. An hour a fortnight (filling in the form and dropping it in at the office) returns about A$400, depending on what benefits you get. No other job will pay as well. So is being on the dole is a "good investment"?

    Well, no. That's because we value things other than just money. We value security/reliability and self-reliance. The government with all its bureaucracy is not very reliable, so we might get the $400 this fortnight, but then not for eight weeks, what then? And we also don't like the idea of being "dole bludgers", we think it's good to be self-reliant for our income.

    The purpose of a water tank is not to save money, but to have water security and to be self-reliant.

    Auckland had a city-wide power outage for several days in I think 1998. Melbourne and 2/3 of Victoria had a power outage for a couple of days a couple of months back. Victoria lost its gas supply for a couple of weeks in 1998. Sydney's water supply became contaminated with poisonous bacteria in 1999. It's entirely possible that in the future this could become more common, or even if rare could last for months rather than days or weeks. So if we can get our own supplies of water, gas and electricity, we should. If the power goes out, that $20 torch you bought suddenly seems like it was a really good investment.

    Self-reliance is a good thing. If it's wrong to be a dole bludger and rely on others for your money, isn't it wrong to be a water bludger, or a food bludger, and rely on others for those things? We talk a lot about working for a living, but the fact is that people don't really want money. We want shelter, clothing, food, water, DVDs and so on. Why not try to get those directly without bothering with the cash?

    But if you're really stuck on the money arguments, just point out that with climate change, Australia is going to become drier. When supply drops, price goes up - water is going to cost a lot more years from now than it does today.
     
  13. gardenlen

    gardenlen Group for banned users

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    g'day wayne,

    the BOM thing is only a guide adn at time can be very poor one at that, they simply don't have enough or the capacity to have enough rain guages around the place, you would be better off maybe using a 'mean' average of say the last 10 years, that may give you a closer idea, but it's still just an idea. the rain fall average for where we where was never reached in our tenure, and waht we got may never be reached in the future?? i dunno just how the planets going.

    the best info' is from an onsite rain guage, is there a neighbour who's been collecting guage figures for the past period? rain comes in corridors and not always the same ones. where we lived on average got 10% more rain than what was recorded at the official rain guage 6 kilometers away, and people living 10 minutes away got around 2/3's or so of what we got.

    6,000 gallon which is in the 25,000 litre range is a good sized tank, go to 8,000 gallon - 33,000 litres app' tank at best, don't believe in having "all one's eggs in one basket" hey? without seeing your situation and without more ground level idea of what rain you do get, i would suggest 2 25,000 litre tanks for each roof.

    as for the long showers they will need to be trimmed, we used a bath and shared it (50 litres of water app'), we washed our hair once a week, reckon excess washing can make it go oilier anyway. but i think you will find as we did using tank water is softer and purer than town water, soap goes a long way further as you need less of it for a lather, same with laundry, we believe in twin tubs, takes 90 litres of water once a week to do 3 loads of washing, we make our own laundry/hand cleaner/general purpose gel as well.

    if needed after we bath we will rinse out our undies at that time. i see tanks as an invetment, and water as gold. even though you own it manage it properly. the greatest saver of water was the dry composting toilet, the only fluid it got was incidental urine, worked a treat. in our current climate i reckon they should ne standard equipment in every home, even if we ahd to create employment and have the bins collected every when ever they are full for composting in another place other than waste valuable drinking water to wash it a long a sewerage network.

    in rural the return from the composted waste was invaluable.

    the only met' i sue is when i look at the radar and sattelite and isobar maps, to work out for myself the likleyhood of rain. BOM are hopeless too many free cups of coffee and similator games and absolutely no 'observation' like the better old days.

    the word wrap thingy is perfect now, so maybe the mod fixed it dunno? it ahppens from time to time someone psot will have a line lenght of waht appears to be 170 characters, long link addresses can do that, but i can read it good now.

    i never bother with the economics of it as good water any other way is unprocurable, the tank is going to last what 30 or 40 or 50 years, you may wear out a few pumps dunno, but that is cheap water and bet it is your water. tanks will only get dearer to buy, and do this for all the right reasons too many doing it because ther is a rebate.

    the rebate save them the hassle later on of finding out who has tanks, but then that's a whole 'nutehr story hey chuckle.

    len
     
  14. LittleFish

    LittleFish Junior Member

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    Hi Wayne
    I think Len touched on this but it is worth restating. Don't just look at your average annual rainfall when determining your tank capacity. What is almost as important is the distribution of rainfall over the year When I was in FNQ all the rain fell (and plenty of it) in a 3 month period and you needed a huge tank to see you through the dry season. If you get good periodic rainfall throughout the year (like down here in S Tas) then you can get by with a much smaller tank capacity as it will be constantly refilled.
    Look instead at your monthly rainfall and compare this against monthly usage rates, this makes calculation a bit harder but will give you a closer approximation of how much storage capacity you need. Also look at all your potential catchment space. A couple of good sheds can double your catchment area, rather than just using the house roof.
    cheers
    Stephen
     
  15. Ing@okaru

    Ing@okaru Guest

    Hi Wayne,
    We have about 130 thousand litres of water storage, which we thought would last us more than a year if we never had a drop of rain. (Family of 4 with teenagers!)
    We have not got a composting toilet, but we treat and recycle our waste water with a commercial system. (Coucil would only bend this far) The recycled water does our garden, and we don't use any fresh water outside the house.
    Now that all the tanks are full, we feel we can relax a little with our water use - meaning it might just go down the sink without being used twice first - but even washing machines use SO much water.
    When we lived in the city - we were able to more than halve our water consumption just by doing simple things. Changing the way we wash clothes, stop trying to have a lawn, mulch instead of pouring water down the drain etc etc.
    I guess that what I am trying to say is you just need to look at what you are doing, and with each thing, to ask yourself if you could do it more efficiently.
    I am not sure how much your tanks will cost you. We have one concrete tank and several plastic ones (wherever we can fit them). We have bought ours over a period of years - so I am not up on the prices - just every time we got a few more dollars together, got another one.
    You don't have to do everything at once, and there's no need to bust a gut financially - do what you can, when you can and how you can. It doesn't matter who's water you are saving (your rain water, or town water) - just get into the habit of saving it, and when you have full capacity in tank water, you'll be fine.
    Good luck!

    Ing
     
  16. frosty

    frosty Junior Member

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    little fish is right it is all about the distribution of the rain ........ in WA the MIN size tank allowed to run a houe is 90000 litres because of our long dry summer and that leaves nothing over for gardens

    frosty
     
  17. gardenlen

    gardenlen Group for banned users

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    then frosty,

    over here in 'troppo land' the minimum tank size to obtain rebate is 3k litres, not enough drinking water for a couple, what huge waste of tax payer dollars, trying to conserve water!!

    the other thing to claculate in to waht needs may be is how many actual "rain days" do you et, now the BOM standard is ".2mm + 1 rain day" so if you research their av' rain day charts keep that in mind, like they said to me at the time "if all you rain days occur in a total of 130 days in the year - then you are going to be sitting there for a lot of days looking at cloudless tourism weather skies".

    eg.,. last month we got 6mm over 6 "rain days", that may fill a 44 gallon drum but it won't do much to top up a little 3k/l or 5k/l tank.

    len
     
  18. Jim Bob

    Jim Bob Junior Member

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    A few days I was talking about water security - making sure you've a reliable supply of water. In case anyone thinks, "oh, the government will make sure we always have some water"... from The Age.

    Euroa residents turn it on but the tap is dry

    Rachel Kleinman
    May 5, 2007

    YESTERDAY dawned no ordinary day in the drought-crippled Victorian town of Euroa. And the water crisis that unfurled after 7am was beyond anything its 2500 residents had experienced, despite grappling with stage 4 restrictions for months.

    "You have no idea what it is like to turn the tap on and nothing is coming out," Strathbogie Shire councillor Robin Weatherald said.

    That line would have sent a shudder through country towns around the state.

    Twelve small towns have been surviving on trucked-in water over summer but yesterday in Euroa, even that emergency source dried up.

    As many people woke to their last working day of the week, they could not flush the toilet or fill the kettle for a cup of tea.

    According to Cr Weatherald, staff at Goulburn Valley Water, which is responsible for the town's supply, were "running around looking for a leak".

    But there wasn't one. Instead the lack of water was blamed on miscommunication between staff and McColl's Transport, the company contracted to truck in water.

    The technical services director of Goulburn Valley Water, Allen Gale, said the authority was still determining what happened. "But somebody did stuff up," he admitted.

    The water authority had been relying on tankers to bring in water and pipe it into the massive concrete tank that sits on the Strathbogie Road, about one kilometre out of town.

    But with rain reaching the town in recent days, the authority planned to crank up its water treatment plant and cut back the supply of expensive trucked water.

    But not yet. "There was a phone call yesterday that said keep tankering all night, and somehow that message got confused and we didn't get as much as we should have," Mr Gale said.

    Cr Weatherald, who runs a Euroa petrol station, was branded a doomsayer recently when he said Euroa residents would have to be evacuated if the water situation got worse.

    But his prediction did not seem so far-fetched yesterday.

    And the town largely known for its associations with legendary bushranger Ned Kelly was in danger of becoming notorious for its lack of water.

    "This gives the impression we don't have a reliable water supply," Cr Weatherald said.

    "People won't want to invest in property here — the economic damage to the town could be quite immense."

    At Euroa Health, which runs a bush hospital and aged-care centre, the staff were more worried about their patients.

    Chief executive Kym Durance said they had used bottled water, supplied by Goulburn Valley, for drinking, toilet-flushing and washing patients. "It has been manageable, but I would be very unhappy if it happened again," he said.

    Hairdresser Lorraine Page told ABC radio she thought she was being punished when she turned her taps on.

    And Nola Exton, a keen gardener who has lived in the town all her life, yelled at her husband from the shower.

    "I thought he had been messing around with the water," Mrs Exton said.
     
  19. kathleenmc

    kathleenmc Junior Member

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    Hi Wayne,

    You're doing a great job with the father factor in greening your bit of Aus'.....I'm wondering if he can access this site at all and do a bit of his own research? How come it's all left up to you to do the hard yards when it comes to sustainability? Get him in here to chat to us about stuff.....we'd love to have him along....

    Cheers Kathleen
     
  20. greeny

    greeny Junior Member

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    some fantstic information here. I need to add my bit...
    I have two plastic 5,000 gallon tanks. Can I say brand names?
    One ways 650kg and looks robust and has 20 year warranty. The other looks flimsy, was sold to me as having a twenty year warranty and now I find it is only ten years. And it weighs 350kg. It begins with a “T”. Both cost about $2,250.00 delivered.
    My neighbors plastic tank has collapsed after 7 years as the wooden support holding the middle up gave way . My other neighbor has a concrete tank that keeps leaking no matter how many people “fix” it.
    Metal tanks around the place keep needing replacing due to corrosion. I worry about fire with plastic.
    All these things lead me to say “why no dam?”
    Dams are the only long term water solution. They require little maintenance and can last generations. They collect from huge downpours which gutters often cant handle.
    They create opportunities for growing different foods . My little dam gives me some peace of mind just knowing it is there,especially in a bushfire. I hardly ever get mossies because the frogs are in abundance. The birds and other animals enjoy it too. .
    Dams don't have to be put in places where they will diminish ecosystems. Mine is not blocking any creek or stream.
    Money spent on a dam is a long term vision, and I like to look generations in advance. And it is most likely the most energy efficient solution for water storage.
    I think a tank will supplement a dam nicely

    :D cheers
     

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